Mine To Mourn: The Mourning Series, #1

By C A Rin

She loved them. She hated them. She wanted them dead.

For as long as Casey can remember, everyone she loves dies. Believing herself cursed, she swears never to allow anyone close to her again.

Fifteen years later, when confronted with the suspicious death of a beloved colleague at the university where she teaches, Casey cannot shake the notion that she is responsible. Scarred by her past, she is evasive when questioned by police, and when DNA implicates her in another unsolved death, suspicions are heightened.

As evidence mounts against her, Casey is forced not only to confront her past but also to test her capacity to trust again as she finds herself inexplicitly drawn to a lead investigating detective. However, as the body count rises, Casey's struggle to exonerate herself reveals evidence more shocking than she can imagine.

Nothing she has relied on is the truth. 
Those she trusted cannot be depended upon. 
And she alone must figure out the identity of a killer she never believed was real.
 

Themes of obsession, self-preservation, and denial-into-discovery are masterfully weaved with intrigue, anticipation, and action in this sexually charged, psychological thriller perfect for fans of Karin Slaughter, Gillian Flynn, or Erica Spindler.

• Language: English
• Publisher: the BEAR the DOGS Publishing
• Release date: Dec 31, 2021
• ISBN: 9780645387209

C A Rin

C A Rin is a writer of thrillers: psychological, crime, and the supernatural. She lives on the Gold Coast of Australia, where many of her stories take place and where local knowledge fuels inspiration in characters and settings.

Book preview

1

For as long as I can remember, death has followed me. Like some besotted lover, it clings possessive and paranoid, sucking the breath from those around me.

It’s not as if some witch doctor has ever thrust a bone in my face or, so far as I know, there isn’t a little hoodoo doll somewhere with pins stuck into it. Frankly, I don’t know who I could have pissed off. But I know it’s real, the consequence of some solemn utterance somewhere, sometime, unknown to me – a curse borne to exact punishment for my sins.

I have always figured it’s because I deserve it. I’m not a particularly good person. My life choices have rarely been great or even blameless ones. At the same time, though, many of those decisions hadn’t been easy, and too often, I wasn’t given an option, which I had hoped would count for something. Apparently not.

I’d like not to believe any of it, but I am left with no choice. I swear the Grim Reaper has hitched a ride on my shoulders. I feel him there, so light in stature that I almost forget, yet too heavy in affliction to deny his presence. God knows I should have the guts to challenge him, but I am a coward. When he’s ready, I tell myself, he will come for me.

***

A mid-January morning, the first light of day rimmed the horizon of the Pacific Ocean and stretched out across the eastern seaboard of the Australian coastline. Its fingers stroked a thousand kilometers of bleached sand, illuminating coves and inlets, and on the Gold Coast, drifted over towering concrete faces into countless glass eyes blinded by its brilliance.

Six thirty-five am, the sea breeze remained reticent today, and broiling humidity oiled the air like a slick broth. The car’s air con wasn’t working again, and Casey hadn’t even reached the freeway before the fabric of her shirt started clinging to her back. She grappled for a water bottle – didn’t have to sip it to know that she could kill two birds with one stone if she put a tea bag in it. Tossing it to the floor, she rolled down the window. The traffic was light on the Pacific Highway, and if she timed the green lights perfectly, she hoped the velocity would help dissipate some of the clamminess before she seriously began perspiring the transgressions of the previous night.

Casey wasn’t much of a socializer, but it had been a quasi-work event, and she had felt an obligation to attend. It had been at one of those chic eateries down at Broadbeach, lots of chargrill and wafts of garlic, but she had still wished she could have just grabbed a pizza to go. These types of events made her anxious, and the least of her favorite pastimes, the small talk – inane exchanges about program funding or worse, those self-serving, up-close-and-personal tell us about yourself moments. As if anyone really cared. She had stoically held back at the bar, a vodka or two, mostly so that she had something to clutch on to, but she was guessing she had lost count of the wines during the meal. It was hard to keep tabs when others kept refilling her glass because she wouldn’t have accepted. She knew she had to leave early. Casey had a date, and her time with Benjamin was important.

She gave the air-conditioning vent a solid whack with the palm of her hand, and reluctantly it coughed out a few cold gasps. She swore it was bloody cursed as well, but she was thankful for its meager offering.

It was cooler along the tree-lined way of University Drive. In the distance, the groundsman on his mower, the scent of cut grass wafted through the open window. The buildings that dominated the university frontage loomed imposingly. A mixture of old and new, the morning sun caught the sandstone in a muted glow that was as ethereal as it was calming. Though Casey had done the drive hundreds of times, there remained something humbling about being here, about teaching generally, being a part of something much larger than the present.

She allowed herself a rush of excitement, along with trepidation that usually came with the beginning of each semester. It would get busy soon, morphing from tranquillity to a hive of youthful purpose, but never too chaotic. Drake was a small university, and with that came less of the pandemonium that had defined her previous campuses. It was a nice change, people had time for you… which, in her case, also posed a problem.

Inner calm came to an abrupt halt when she spotted the vehicles. Three marked police vehicles, two dark sedans angled diagonally across the edge of the lawn. Further along, an unmarked white van. Casey’s stomach knotted. These were the responders to unfortunate circumstances, and their presence gnawed a little too close to the bone. She flexed her fingers and loosened the grip on the steering wheel. Focused on keeping the speed dial below the designated twenty kilometers.

The car parks were empty, but she headed for her usual space across from the footpath that led to her office. She cracked open the rear windows, instantly vanishing the cool trickle that the air-con had finally decided to hack up. Pushing a wayward curl from her face, she slathered it down to join the others already retreating into their natural state of confusion and peeled herself off the seat.

Avoiding the main path, Casey began her circumnavigation across campus. Not toward the bustle of activity, she didn’t want to see what was going on. Whatever it was, it was none of her business, and she had never understood the ghoulish fascination of hovering around accident scenes. She would take the long way, past the gym and the student business center. Undercover, she told herself, as if that was a perfectly logical reason to double the journey. It was early, the little voice of justification reasoned, the stroll would be nice.

Nice, my arse. Even facing forward, it was hard to avoid the peripherals. Casey picked up the pace. Looked down at her feet. Corkscrew shoots coiling through the cracks that puckered the edges of the concrete pavers—an army of ants in purposeful procession. Whatever was happening elsewhere, she didn’t care, even though her subconscious never got that memo, and scenarios flickered.

They were all banal, which was good in that respect. That was one of her coping methods, downplay the drama – she didn’t do cataclysmic anymore. Orientation Week was over, but kids would be kids when they were away from home. She found herself hoping it was merely the aftermath of some unruly behavior, too much partying from the night before. Maybe a drug bust or a mugging. The discreditable underbelly of the Gold Coast knew there was vulnerability here, rich kids for the picking.

She shook off the thoughts. How desperate did she have to be to hope it was a mugging, and who was she kidding? It didn’t look good. The pace was not picking up. No one was hustling. It was never good when there was no hustle.

The police tape swung as it caught a breeze and, with it, another hit of apprehension, corpulent this time and spreading. It was not a large area, but large enough.

Her guts squeezed again, and all her attempts to disengage from what was happening on the edges of her vision dissolved. There were no edges to tragedy where she was concerned. No tiptoeing precariously around its perimeter. It was boots and all with her, and she swallowed the rising despair. Casey knew that building. She knew what faculty it was and which offices were on each floor. And she knew that window above the yellow tape, the one that was shattered now, because that was where she was last night.

Now she was running. Hop stepping the pavers, narrowly avoiding a collision with the café guy hauling his refuse bin. Casey didn’t apologize; she needed to get to the sanctuary of her office. She punched the third-floor button. Punched it again before pushing herself into the corner of the elevator.

Ding.

The door opened, and three sets of eyes turned in her direction. Two she recognized from the party last night, the other one was cleaning staff, Naomi someone. Casey had heard her life story one morning as her shift had ended and hers had begun. Marriage, births, and divorces over coffee and cleaning fluid. At least her office had gotten a good going over that day. At least that was a normal day.

She ignored the huddle of concerned looks. She had nothing to say, and she didn’t have to ask what was going on. Mostly, she didn’t want to hear his name because she knew it was Benjamin.

Dear God. Just like Tony. Like all the others before them. What have I done?

Thrust so deeply into her chair it threatened to swallow her, Casey’s breathing was coming in shallow waves, pushing her into light-headedness. She had known Benjamin Adler since she was eighteen and just another kid, rampant and unmanageable. He had been one of her first professors and the only person who had cared enough to detangle her damage and begin to turn her into someone who could believe in themselves. He’d inspired, and he’d encouraged. He had never tried to persuade her to follow anything but her dreams, even if she had chosen English Lit over Psych. To say he had turned her life around would have been an understatement.

Casey had been stoked when she had heard he was at the same university where she was to begin a teaching fellowship—excited at the possibility of opening herself up to sharing once again. Friendship and the comfort of reciprocation, even though she hadn’t known if she would be capable of letting go of the reticence she knew she portrayed to others – after all, mastering the art of aloofness came so naturally to her now. But, with Benjamin, it had been easy. Like her, he had known loss. Heartache, he would say, was a human quality, par for the course. He still believed in the good in people. He never judged. He also didn’t believe in personifications of death or jinxes, and, as Casey stifled a sob, he had made her believe the secrets that she carried and the fears she harbored may not be so insurmountable. She needed to be with someone with that resilience to show her how it should be done. She had so much to learn from this man.

A sharp pain stabbed her left index finger. Casey had been pushing her thumbnail so hard into the flesh an angry welt had formed. She released it, sending a tingle through her hand – but it was a momentary distraction. She needed to stand. She needed air. It would be eighteen months to the day since she first arrived at the university.

Eighteen months - and what ruin she had brought.

Turning her head toward the brightness of the window, Casey counted to five. If this were a movie, there would be some sort of euphoric music that would lead her toward it and beyond. She shoved the ridiculousness from her thoughts. She was more than capable of holding back and was safer where she was, in quiet reflection, memories… and denial. If she didn’t believe what people were saying, if she didn’t have confirmation, everything stayed the same. Right? Like when you’re waiting for test results or a doctor’s prognosis, there was that time existing in the eye of the storm where your ignorance still protected you. Nothing bad had happened. Something good might.

Six, seven, eight.

Casey gave in. Shuffled forward. At the window, she swallowed trepidation, breathed in courage. Across the quadrant was the Psychology faculty, her line of sight angled almost entirely over the scene unfolding. Like some Peeping Tom, back to the wall, neck chickened out, she peered down. Blinked to adjust to the change in light.

Casey’s focus landed on the van, its back doors closed. One man dressed in dark clothing leaned on its side while the other had his hands in his pockets, staring off toward the sports fields. A police officer approached, and they exchanged words. She watched until he disengaged, swaggering off the way they do, in their vests, and belts, and shit. She shifted her curiosity further back, just right of center.

Whatever, whoever, lay mostly obscured from her view in the grass behind a shallow manicured hedge. With the lack of rain, its foliage was sparse, and she could make out a shape between its tangled bark. As she stared, it became less of a form than a feeling—of heaviness hovering low, coiled, and black. It bristled the hair on her arms and constricted what little air was in her chest.

Standing directly behind the hedge was a heavy-set man. Shiny-faced and flushed, his suit jacket discarded, tie knotted low on his chest, his shirt sleeves rolled to his elbows. From her elevated position, she noticed a bald patch that was turning red. Beside him was a woman. She looked a bit like an alien marshmallow in her pale blue coveralls. She was either small, or the suit was several sizes too big. Functional though, she imagined, for the task at hand.

The man crouched, a laborious movement onto one knee that looked preposterously like he was about to propose. Of course, if this were a proposal, which it wasn’t, Casey imagined the answer would be no. Whatever he said, the woman rejected with a pout, and he was left there for several beats until, with an awkward arch of his back, he straightened. The woman’s lips were moving, a conversation directed at the ground, before she nodded towards the men at the van. They pulled forward a gurney and ambled it over. Casey squeezed her eyes and inhaled. Exhaled—it came out as a whimper.

From a shadowed corner, another man stepped into the light. She hadn’t noticed him before, younger than the other one, at least slimmer with more hair, and despite the heat, he was in a suit jacket. The older man ignored him, looking up now toward the window directly above him and across the campus. His eyes panned across the adjacent buildings and up to where Casey stood. Rested them there.

Casey pushed back against the wall.

He hadn’t seen her, she was pretty sure of that, but even if he had, what would it matter? She hadn’t done anything wrong.

Had she?

Crumpled within the refuge of her chair, its familiar creak only reaffirmed the weight of her angst. Casey’s mind was everywhere and nowhere, all at the same time. She focused on an ink mark on the table. It looked like a palm print, with stubby fingers and a trailing thumb. The more she scrutinized, the more it added to her agitation.

Fingers curling, trailing, fingers…

He used to come in her dreams… the Reaper. Not so much lately, though she remembered now – last night. As usual, she couldn’t see his face, but this time, something had changed. No longer the caricature of her younger years, twisted leer glimpsed through hooded folds, scythe grasped in gnarly fingers. Last night, his body was lean and hard, his hands tapered and strong. Last night she hadn’t fought him. Instead, she had allowed him closer, close enough so that, perhaps, she would have the advantage, rip the shroud from his shoulders, reveal him to be nothing but a figment of her disturbed imagination. Instead, she had let him linger, allowed his fingers to roam like a blind man skimming braille. Why? Why had she done that? She frowned. She had woken to bedsheets tangled, agitated yet strangely aroused.

Casey slapped her palms to her face, disgusted. She was a coward then, which made her a coward now.

What have I done?

The door flung open. A woman, thirty-something, navy suit, white shirt. Teary-eyed and red-nosed, ‘Casey. Oh my God…’ she started.

Casey did not want to hear what she had to say. She gave her blankest stare—but this was Margo, and as verbal was to diarrhea, Margo was to dysentery; a vacant expression was hardly going to be a deterrent.

Margo had her handbag hitched over her shoulder and car keys in hand. It looked like she had made a beeline to Casey’s office specifically to let loose. As administrative assistant to the Dean, why she wasn’t on the sixth floor where she belonged, Casey didn’t know, but for someone who operated where the most amount of drama could be inflicted, Margo’s path of hysteria had clearly stretched her way.

‘The police, there’re everywhere, and the ambulance thingy—the coroner’s van… they’re saying it’s Professor Adler. Can you believe it? He’s dead. He must have fallen from the window. Oh my God, the media trucks are here. That woman on the seven o’clock news, in a red dress, she’s here…’

Casey forced herself not to break down. A name. A confirmation she didn’t need. Everything else became a nonsensical hum. She concentrated on in-animation. It wasn’t that difficult—like having a paper bag over her head, Margo’s voice became suitably muffled.

‘They think it happened last night,’ Margo said.

That got through, and Casey stifled an inner scream.

She was with him last night. How was that possible? The question, submerged in denial, seeped to the surface.

‘They think he was depressed,’ Margo carried on, ‘with facing retirement and all, but listen to this, or maybe he was pushed…’ tears now, ‘out of the window.’

Again, Casey’s heart ramped to disintegrate. Who’s ‘they?’ she wanted to shout. Instead, she stared blankly, swallowing the bilious dread constricting her guts.

Margo was a blubbing mess, and she handed her a tissue. Knew the woman thought she was a bitch because she looked like she didn’t care.

‘Thank you,’ Casey finally announced. She had made it through her first lecture of the semester, though, honestly, she didn’t remember much of the last ninety minutes. There had been odd energy in the hall, and she wasn’t the only one having a hard time focussing. The students were distracted, though, understandably, with the police and media presence, the campus abuzz with gossip, the texts and traditions in literary classics were not exactly trending topics. ‘I’ll see some of you in the tutorial, to everyone else, next week.’

‘There’s no tutorial this week,’ a voice yelled from the upper rows.

Casey concealed her faux pas with a smile in its direction. ‘That’s correct.’ Inside, she scolded herself but dealt up an authoritative, ‘if you have any queries, anything at all, you’ll note my consultation times, or you can drop me an email.’

A few faces nodded. Most were already heading for the door.

As she scrambled with the projector’s extension cord, she made mental notes for the following week, primarily around getting her shit together. Casey had had to fight like a mad dog to get this class, and she was not giving Marjorie Hughes, the old battle-ax, any excuse to demand it back from her. Marjorie had been a thorn in her side since she arrived, and no way was she giving her the satisfaction to use anything against her. A seasoned pro at meddling, she seemed, for whatever reason, to have made it personal.

Casey must have yanked too hard on the cord; the folder perched on the table’s edge toppled and landed on her head. It wasn’t that it hurt. It was just one of those ‘fuck it’ moments when the day needed to end before she snapped.

A shuffle alerted her she was not alone.

Beside her, sneakers, scuffed and angled close. Casey craned her neck upward, past khaki pants, an Aztec-y woven belt, a white cotton shirt crumpled at the front. She made it up to a face—Jake somebody from her lecture. She didn’t know him personally yet, but he was standing a little too close, and the fact that she was scrunched at groin level instantly awkward.

He was speaking… asking a question. Perfectly reasonable, something she had said during the lecture. Seconds passed before she realized she hadn’t said anything.

‘You okay?’ Jake bent to retrieve her folder.

‘What?’ Casey unfolded, Transformers’ style, back to a standing position.

‘Is it true? Is it Professor Adler?’

She felt like snapping that it was none of his business, but honestly, she had to get it together. ‘Yeah, it’s a shock to us all,’ she said.

‘They say he jumped.’

Casey swallowed, reset, and resisted the urge to point out that the window was broken, and most suicides don’t break windows before they… whatever, she was not going there. ‘I don’t know,’ she said instead, ‘but the police are on to it. There’s little they can’t solve these days.’

‘You knew him quite well, didn’t you?’

She offered up a glower. Clearly, the kid didn’t take non-verbal cues.

‘Sorry,’ he said but kept his stare steady. ‘I’ve noticed you around with him on the campus. You always look like you’re having these great conversations.’

‘He’ll be sadly missed by all of us,’ Casey’s stony acknowledgment.

‘Yeah,’ he mumbled, ‘too bad. I guess shit happens.’

A cloying taste of spoiled milk rose to the back of her throat. Casey knew the cause was not this morning’s coffee, but those words – it was what she always said.

Always, the sentiment draped languorously, shit happens.

It happened when she lost her parents.

She recalled it with a surreal clarity, like a Disney movie most little girls of that age would obsess over, except for Casey, it was her parent’s death, or at least its aftermath and, quite frankly, everything since.

2

Mummy calls me her big girl. To Daddy, I’m still his baby princess, but that’s okay coming from him. Five years old is important. I’m going to school, and I can ride my bike without the extra wheels. I get to rearrange my room the way I want, and sometimes I get to stay up a little later, like tonight.

I’m warm and pink after my bath, sitting on the carpet in my flannel PJs. They’re peppermint green and smell of baby powder, which I secretly love even though I’m not a baby anymore, so they shouldn’t be calling it that. The Barbies are propped out in front of me. All four of them are friends, and for some reason, it makes sense that they are all called Barbie, and this is not in the least bit confusing. It’s cold outside, so I’ve been rugging them up in their winter outfits, little scarves, and boots in a mix-up of shades.

The familiar chime of the doorbell. It’s odd because it’s night time, but I know it won’t have anything to do with me. Night-time is for grown-ups, and it’s not Mummy and Daddy because they are at a party. They’ve already kissed me good night because I’ll be asleep when they get back.

Mary is here, my babysitter. I frown at that word ‘baby’ again. How’s a kid supposed to grow up when it’s everywhere. Anyway, she is here, and she’s the grown-up, and she deals with grown-up stuff. Unless it’s her boyfriend arriving, in which case, I’m curious. She’s not supposed to have anyone over because she has to pay attention to me, but I know she sometimes has Jarod over. I came down once and caught them all lovey-dovey on the couch. Jarod gave me this mean look, like it’s his house, the schmuck, and Mary got all flustered. She gave me a packet of M&Ms, which both of us knew I shouldn’t have after I’d brushed my teeth, and made me promise not to tell Mummy. Honestly, I don’t know what the fuss was about.

From the top of the stairs, I peer through the banisters. Mummy got all dressed up tonight, and I can smell her perfume on the landing of the hallway. It’s like she’s still around, and I feel guilty because I should be in bed. I stay anyway; you never know, there might be more M&Ms to be made. A man and a lady in dark blue coats stand in the doorway and are whispering to Mary. She weirdly shakes her wrists and then turns sharply as they follow her into the living room. I can’t hear or see anything now, but it’s got to be more exciting than what the Barbies have to say, so I make my way down the stairs.

By the time I get to the door of the sitting room, all three are huddled. Mary looks up like she’s surprised to see me, which is dumb because I live here, and I’m why she’s here. She’s been crying, her eyes are red, and her nose is running. I’ve never seen her cry, and I feel another jolt of guilt, only bigger like I’ve done something wrong, and I back up and crouch against the wall.

It’s the lady who calls me back. I curl my toes into the carpet, but she has a nice face, and her voice isn’t cross. ‘Come, Cassandra,’ she says.

The second I’m in the room, Mary pulls me to the couch and folds me into her chest. The lady does most of the talking. She reminds me of Amy, my pre-school teacher, the way she talks at you, expecting that you don’t talk back. She tells me there’s been an accident, and my parents will not be coming home. I look over at Mary.

‘Mary’s here,’ I answer, ‘It’s okay.’

But then she talks more, and I’m getting the picture. Like a real accident, a serious one, like when I was racing my friend Mandy across the monkey bars, and she fell, and then she never came back to school, or after I’d fed Goldie and they found him floating on the top of the water in his bowl, or when I left the cage door open, and next morning I saw Minnie Mouse, all mangled and bloody under the paws of Mrs. Wiggs’ cat… Something like that…

‘It’s not my fault,’ I say, but it’s more of a question than a statement because it could be, it could be, my fault… like before.

In gasps and lots of head shaking, they tell me that, of course, it isn’t. Still, I keep saying that I told Mummy and Daddy not to miss the party because of me, and I don’t know if that could mean it was my fault. I start to cry, salty tears that sting my eyes.

‘No,’ they swear and seem so sure. They keep saying it was an accident, a terrible accident.

I nod, and a dull understanding washes through me even though my head still feels woozy, and the panic is real. This is way worse than when I left Mummy’s side in the supermarket. I’d run up and down aisles that had become a blur of colors filled with words I couldn’t read yet. It had seemed like forever before Mummy whisked me into her arms, and I didn’t know whether I was going to get a smack or a tighter hug. ‘Cassandra,’ she’d said, ‘never leave me, never leave me like that,’ and I said no, that I’d never. But now I’m confused because, this time, she’s the one who’s left me, and Mummy and Daddy are never coming back to scold me and then hug me again.

So many people come and go—so many names and faces that I don’t bother to remember. I sleep in so many different beds, and I had stopped crying by then too. Too many people telling me to shut up, be a big girl, stop being a baby… when all I want to be is a baby again.

Instead, what I have become is an orphan.

They don’t really use that word anymore, but when you have no mum and dad, that’s what you are. It sounds fancy, like in Oliver Twist or in Orphan Annie, but being an orphan sucks. I’m abandoned and unloved. I wonder if it’s wrong to feel so sorry for myself. Sometimes I make believe that I’m a princess trapped in a prison tower waiting for a horrible curse to be lifted. Sometimes I think I’ll always be trapped in its evil grasp because why not…

3

Shit happens.

Jake’s face contorted into a look of puzzlement. It circled like a holograph, and a rush of heat burned Casey’s cheeks.

‘I’ll leave you then?’

‘What?’

‘You look a million miles away.’

Casey stumbled over an ‘Ah…’

‘I’ll let you go.’

A forced smile and an attempt at recovery. ‘Right. That question?’

‘It’ll keep.’

The smile dissolved as she watched him go. What just happened?

She had all the time in the world to think about that, as the day turned into the longest one ever. She had no tutorials, as she had been reminded, but staff had been told to stick around for police interviews, otherwise, no brainer, she would have scarpered. Begrudgingly, Casey had remained at her desk, shuffling through papers, perusing outdated alumni magazines, and sucking on the edge of a cardboard coffee cup until the inevitable knock on the door. It had taken detectives until close to four before they made it around to her, and by then, the adrenalin that had kept her going was all but vaporized. Honestly, she felt more like a deflated balloon than a human being. That… and scared.

Casey’s office was not large, a desk took up most of the floor space, and with filing cabinets surrounding the perimeter, cozy would be an understatement. When the two men finally shuffled in, they kinked into a single file. She didn’t get up, and she didn’t make any attempt to shake hands, though everyone was close enough that all three could have hugged it out. She knew it was probably rude, but somehow, she didn’t think it was expected under these circumstances—shaking hands, not hugging, so Casey remained seated. Tried to soften any outward signs of nervousness.

These were the guys she had watched from her window, but up close, they were much more daunting. Another step in the reality of the situation. She inched taller in her chair and took in their presence.

The older wore